Christmas at the Little Waffle Shack - Helen J. Rolfe Page 0,42

of the terrible jobs they’d both had as kitchen hands, although Benjamin’s sounded worse than his. He’d worked a stint in a restaurant on the Norfolk coast where the owner had served a good Sunday roast. Unfortunately, as waiting staff brought plates from the restaurant into the kitchen for washing up, Benjamin had been instructed that any roast potatoes left on the plates – whole ones, obviously – could be scraped into an awaiting bowl and reused on the next roast dinner to go out to customers.

‘He used to offer me a roast dinner on the house at the end of my shift,’ Benjamin laughed into his pint. ‘Funnily enough, I’d always tell him I had one waiting for me at home.’

‘Don’t know how he got away with it. The hygiene courses and certifications now are lengthy and I don’t think any business owner can afford to risk their customers’ health like that. I can’t imagine keeping an uneaten portion of waffle and slapping it onto someone else’s plate. And I hope you didn’t bring any of those practices here to the pub.’

‘He’d better not have done.’ Terry, the landlord, had overheard their conversation as he strode across the pub collecting glasses, ducking each beam. Terry had been one of those to treat Daniel no differently than before, to not even bat an eyelid that he was back, and it was good to be able to sit in here without judgement. Daniel would be forever grateful he’d never wronged Heritage Cove’s publican because not having a watering hole didn’t bear thinking about when the next nearest pub was at least four miles away.

When Benjamin’s girlfriend Zoe arrived, Daniel left them to it and set off along The Street hoping Lucy would still be awake and ready for a visitor. And when he saw a light coming from the door to the workshop, he knew his luck was in and headed on down the path.

There was no need to ring the new doorbell – the door was ajar – and when he peeked in, Lucy was using a tool that produced a lot of sparks as well as noise. She had the same helmet on that she’d been wearing the first day they met and he hovered as she worked so he didn’t frighten her.

At last she spotted him, turned off the machine and set down the tool she was handling. She lifted off her helmet and, just like the first time, her hair tumbled down across her shoulders, except rather than being straight, this time it was wavy.

‘You’re curly,’ he said, pointing to her hair when she set her helmet down, removed a thick glove and came on over.

She put a hand to her hair. ‘I wound it into plaits last night, I’m experimenting for Christmas-party season, you know what it’s like. Or maybe not,’ she smiled coyly.

‘It suits you.’ He had a feeling anything would. And he kind of liked it that he’d caught her off guard. It showed a different Lucy to the confident one he’d become used to, or the sad one he’d seen when they met outside the chapel after she’d been listening to carols.

‘Thanks. Right, the sign.’ She led him through to the more comfortable side of the workshop. ‘Here it is.’

Beside the desk the sign and its bracket sat proudly and a smile broke across his face. ‘It’s amazing. I’m more than happy with it, you’ve done a brilliant job.’ The lettering was held together in a way that flowed, the scrolling details every bit as expert as he’d come to realise Lucy could deliver. ‘The Little Waffle Shack,’ he recited, because seeing it on the sign was a confirmation of the business he would make a success of, no matter what his brother thought. He’d opted not to paint wording on the shack itself, preferring to leave it as a log cabin, traditional and welcoming without looking commercialised. Instead, he’d have this wrought-iron sign hanging on his new lamp-post out front and he’d already got approval from the council to put a sign by the bus stop to direct people up to the cabin from The Street.

‘I’m glad you’re pleased with it,’ she smiled. ‘You need to hang it.’ She picked up her keys. ‘Come on, no time like the present.’

He laughed. ‘Now? Are you serious? It’s dark out there. And cold.’

‘Don’t be such a wuss,’ she called back from the workshop, where she was already ensuring the machine was definitely switched off,